


Fainne Solais

by Edie_Sunshine



Series: Just Two Guys [23]
Category: Sons of Anarchy
Genre: Belfast, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Family, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Season/Series 03
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-01
Updated: 2013-06-01
Packaged: 2017-12-13 15:57:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,341
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/826093
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Edie_Sunshine/pseuds/Edie_Sunshine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Juice has spent the last however long watching Chibs, seen the way the man's eyes go all twitchy whenever anyone mentions Ireland, or the IRA, or Jimmy O'Phelan, and he knows to be scared. Chibs is fearless, nothing worries him. Seeing him knocking back whiskey at nine in the morning, his hand shaking around his glass, makes Juice sweat.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fainne Solais

**Author's Note:**

> Story is set during Season 3, which puts it kind of out of sequence with the rest of this series. Ah well... like me, you're probably all using the dead time betweens seasons 5 and 6 to rewatch previous seasons, anyway...;0)
> 
> Beta'd by the fantastic (and overworked) Spacebabe. If you haven't already, you NEED to check out her Chibs/ Juice fic over on SOA Slash on LJ.

This is the first time Juice has ever left the U.S. There was a tight knot of something in his belly the whole flight over, that should have been excitement, but wasn't.

Juice has spent the last however long watching Chibs, seen the way the man's eyes go all twitchy whenever anyone mentions Ireland, or the IRA, or Jimmy O'Phelan, and he knows to be scared. Chibs is fearless, nothing worries him. Seeing him knocking back whiskey at nine in the morning, his hand shaking around his glass, makes Juice sweat.

They're driven from the airport to Stranraer in a couple of busted transit vans, so any hopes Juice might have had of seeing something of the English and Scottish countryside are quickly lost.

Bobby insists on riding in the front of one van, Gemma commandeers the passenger seat in the other.

'Motion sickness,' Clay says. 'Both of them.' He closes his eyes and stretches out on one bench in the back of the first van. 'Don't want either of them back here.'

'Yeah, boat ride'll be fun...' Opie adds from the opposite bench, his head tipped back against the inside wall, and Clay chuckles.

Juice is last in, and he has to huddle at the back. With Clay and Opie in the van, there's zero leg room.

The catch on the van door doesn't work. It's held together with a piece of shitty nylon rope. Juice spends most of the ride holding it shut, so he won't end up dashed on the road below. Even with wall to wall pukers, the ferry ride's gotta be better than this...

Juice is usually pretty good on water- you don't grow up in the New York suburbs without taking a few ferry rides. He imagines wandering about on deck, Chibs pointing out the Scottish cliffs disappearing in one direction, Irish ones appearing on the horizon, telling funny stories and dicking around.

The sky's lost in the fog, though, and the sea's so choppy that no one'll come up on deck with Juice. Bobby's yelling for his buddies, Huey and Ralph, in the guy's toilets, and everyone else slouches around in the cafeteria or the lounge bar, drinking warm British beer and complaining about their jetlag. Chibs hunkers down in a corner with his hipflask hidden from the bar staff, and once he's checked that they're all bearing up, he hardly speaks to anyone.

Juice borrows jackets off of everyone, pulls them on, one on top of the other so he probably looks like the Michelin man. The wind still bites at his face, tugs the oxygen out from under his nose so he has to gasp for each breath. After the wet dog stink of the van, it's a relief. For about ten minutes, and then it's way, way too cold and he has to go back inside.

There's a little gift shop onboard, selling shitty souvenirs, picture postcards of Stranraer and Belfast. Juice leafs through the images of cute, old fashioned street scenes, lighthouses, and lonely buses winding through hilly roads.

'Is this like where you grew up?' he asks Chibs, holding up a postcard. Chibs just snorts, tells him not to be daft. It's okay, though, Juice has pretty much figured out that Chibs calling him 'daft' isn't like everyone else calling him 'stupid'. It's kind of gentle, like if they were alone, it would be accompanied by a kiss to the side of his head and a slap on the ass.

They meet up with the Belfast boys at dawn and Chibs exchanges raucous hugs and back-slaps with his old brothers. He beams at Paddy, his sort-off nephew- actually his uncle's son, so Chibs' cousin, but with twenty years between them, nephew makes more sense.

'Last time I saw this wee shite,' Chibs grins, 'he was still in nappies.'

'Yeah. I was fifteen at the time,' Paddy says, and everyone starts laughing. Chibs just hugs the guy again, and the two of them murmur to each other in tightly wound accents, their faces serious. Juice feels the distance between himself and the Scot grow a little more.

The Belfast President has that relaxed swagger to him that says he's in charge and can beat any challenger. Just like Clay. It's kinda warm, reassuring. Juice can almost imagine being able to tell the guy anything, feel the belongingness of a fatherly slap on the back. The club's sergeant, O'Neill, though, there's something sly about him. And, even though Chibs seems fond of the guy, Juice can't bring himself to like him much.

Juice looks around at the Belfast Charter and tries to imagine Chibs as one of them. It doesn't fit, like something's missing. Chibs isn't one of them anymore, he's a Redwood Original, through and through.

 

&&&

 

Chibs is reunited with Fiona and his kid later that day and Juice has to tamp down on the weird little feeling that gives him- he should be happy for the guy, after all. Juice looks at Chibs with his family and it's plain to him that although Chibs is no longer Sambel's, but Samcro's, out here, he isn't Juice's, he's theirs.

That afternoon, while everyone's drowsy with jetlag and Gemma is curled up, asleep on the couch, Chibs sits downstairs in the clubhouse with Fiona and Kerrianne, their voices soft and smiling.

Juice keeps his distance, hangs out with Paddy, who is pretty funny when Juice can actually understand a word that comes out of his mouth, and who tells wild stories about what Chibs used to get up to when he'd been a member of Sambel.

'Ain't shittin' yer. Three a them.' Paddy knocks back the remains of his pint, holds up the empty glass for the girl serving behind the bar to refill it. 'They was all dolled up in, I dunno, ball gowns. An' there's my uncle, just in his boots an' his underpants!' Paddy makes a start on the whiskey shot the girl slides down the bar for him, gives her an exaggerated wink over the top of it and slides it back. 'No idea how he got out with his bollocks still attached...'

Juice isn't really sure whether he can believe the guy or not. It's not that he doesn't believe Chibs would gatecrash a wedding, it's just that he can't really imagine anyone passing out drunk in a hotel bath tub, for two days straight, and then stumbling downstairs, half naked, into the middle of a Unionist societal function, and picking up three desperate housewives from right under their powerful husbands' noses.

'Our Kerrianne's happy to see her Da,' Paddy comments more quietly, later on, nodding his pint glass over at where the girl sits, mute and staring. Juice wonders how the guy can tell. Kerrianne is meek, with frightened eyes and a frown etched into her features. Her every movement is like she's apologising for something, getting ready to duck away from a punch.

Then, Juice looks again and he sees that the kid doesn't take her eyes off her father, like she's trying to memorise his face. She's not expecting him to stay, that much is clear. She's expecting to get thrown back to Jimmy.

'Juicy boy. Need a favour.' Chibs corners him by the dartboard.

'Yeah? What's up?'

'Keep Kerrianne company for a bit? Me an' Fi are gonna...' Chibs gestures upstairs.

It's weird. If Chibs was talking about a hook up with some chick, he'd say so, or give a crude gesture. But Fi isn't some hook up: even after everything, she's Chibs' old lady.

Something twists in Juice's gut, but he nods, says sure, and Chibs breaks into a grin. 'Don't let Paddy wind her up, eh?'

'Ah, uncle. As if I would!' Paddy claps Chibs on the shoulder and bursts out laughing. He swaggers over to Kerrianne, his voice loud enough to carry across the bar, 'Which boy band is it today then, Kizzie?' He tugs one of the headphone buds out of the girl's ear and sticks it in his own, 'Oooh, it's Jedward! They're so gorgeous!' He starts jumping up and down and squealing. Kerrianne's frown deepens.

Juice doesn't hear what Kerrianne says over the noise in the bar, but Paddy flinches and staggers back, knocking a stool to the ground and jostling Liam's pint hand. Juice guesses she must have given him a good shove.

At Juice's side, Chibs laughs and mutters 'that's my girl', before Fi comes over and slides her hand up around his waist, under his shirt. She gives him a little shove with her hip.

'That's me getting my orders then,' Chibs murmurs and lets Fi lead him out of the bar.

Juice reminds himself that this is good, it means Chibs is happy, something he's not been for a long time.

He keeps Kerrianne's coke topped up and lets Paddy do the talking till it's time for Chibs to take her and her mother back to St. Matts.

 

&&&

 

Chibs' head is nodding towards the table when Juice appears before him, dressed in t shirt and boxers. The clock on the wall tells him it's after three, and it looks like everyone else turned in already.

Chibs blinks at the half empty bottle before him. Hadn't realised he'd gotten through so much. It's this fucking place. The Army, the Rozzers, same old shite...

A few hours ago, he was hunkered down in the back of a jeep, his wife and daughter cowering beneath him as unionist bullets whizzed over their heads. He'd pressed his hands over Kerrianne's ears and she'd quaked against his chest like some baby chick, fallen from the nest. She'd not made a sound, though.

He'd held them both, and he'd prayed that his own body would be enough of a barrier between his girls and those bullets. It's funny, but if you'd told him, even an hour beforehand that there was a god worth praying to, he'd have laughed his arse off.

And even though he knew it was the safest place for them, he'd felt like an utter bastard, abandoning them both at St Matts, knew though, that, as always, he wouldn't be enough to keep them safe. The only way for Kerrianne to have a future was for Jimmy to be dead. No matter what it took.

At St Matts, Kerrianne had hugged him goodnight, whispered that she was gonna go pray for them all. He hadn't dared to ask what she was going to ask god to do, hearing her talk of violence or bloodshed would have broken him to pieces.

He'd looked around him and all of the saints had stared down at him from on high, knowing and judging. Fi's hand had given his own a little convulsive squeeze but it hadn't helped, and he had no idea at what point it had stopped helping. He couldn't even remember the last time it hadn't just left him feeling hollowed out and useless.

Now, standing before him in the dosshouse sitting room, Juice is like some vision from another world, somewhere safe and warm and full of sunshine.

'Hey man, go to bed.'

'Aye, alright.' Chibs lets himself be led to the little room they're sharing. There are two beds, but they're pushed so close together they might as well be one. There's still barely enough room to swing a cat.

Today has been fucking sureal. Getting pulled over by the cops, being reunited with his former brothers and then Kerrianne. The strange, unsettled feeling of Fiona's arms around him, her face glad and guilty.

For weeks he'd been torturing himself, remembering Jimmy's threat to shift his attention from Fiona to Kerrianne and he'd felt sick- what if it hadn't just been a threat? What if his daughter flinched away from him, skittish and afraid?

But, Kerrianne had let him hold her, her hug surprisingly fierce, and he'd been shocked at how tall she'd gotten in the years that had passed. How like Fi she looked.

Chibs sits down on his bed, his body feeling heavy and slow. No point getting undressed properly, he's gotta get up again in a couple of hours. Easier to just get out of his boots and his jeans, sleep in everything else.

'Juicy, what are you-' Juice is on the floor before him, patiently un-knotting the laces on Chibs' boots, easing them off and lining them up on the floor just under the bed.

'Come on man, you're not sleeping in your clothes.'

'Ach, alright then, Ma!' Chibs is too tired to argue. He lets Juice guide him to his feet and unbuckle his jeans for him, slide them down his legs before pushing him back down again and working his way through the buttons on Chibs' shirt. Juice folds Chibs' clothes and places them on the kit bags stashed in the corner. He coaxes Chibs into one of the beds, pulling the sheets and blanket up over him. It's a bit like being four again. Chibs wonders if Juice is gonna perch on the side of the bed, tell him a story and whisper a kiss into his hairline, 'sleep tight, don't let the beasties bite.'

The sheets smell of Fi still.

His wife had been warm, familiar as a well-loved pair of jeans. It's strange how easily they can just fall into old patterns, old feelings, as if the years that have passed are just minutes. Part of Chibs wants to turn his face into the pillow, get lost in memories of this afternoon.

'You okay?' Juice asks, dragging Chibs back into the present.

Lad looks nervous, like he doesn't know what to do. Looking up at Juice from this angle, the electric light shining behind him gives him a weird halo, like one of the Icons in St Matts. Chibs remembers being a kid, looking up at those paintings when he should have had his head bowed and his eyes closed. They'd always been so kindly and knowing, it had felt like nothing bad could ever happen to you while they were watching. Those paintings had been the only reason Chibs didn't fight going to church with Mam. Everyone around him, sitting there, muttering their dreams to the Virgin, and Chibs had been left alone with his guardian angels.

Right now, Juice is looking down at him like he knows Chibs is knee deep in shite, drowning in all of his memories and fears of this place, wants to pull him free. Chibs reaches out and catches the younger man's hand. 'Hey, thanks for today,' he says because that's all he can think to say, and Juice gives a little shrug, tells him to close his eyes.

Chibs must have done as he was told because the next he knows, the room is dark, and a hot, wet mouth is sliding down over his cock, coaxing him into hardness.

 

&&&

 

Chibs tastes a little like his bedsheets smell right now, a mixture of the scent Juice is used to, and someone else.

Juice doesn't think about it, focuses instead, on the task of getting the guy hard. He has no idea why he's doing this. Maybe it's the fear he's seen in Chibs' eyes for the last few weeks, or maybe it's just the sheer loneliness Juice has been feeling since they got here. He knows that for the next ten minutes or so, he can kid himself that Chibs is his again.

Chibs gasps and sighs above him, slides one palm over Juice's scalp, as if he's trying to remind himself who it is blowing him.

It's pitch dark in the room, the curtains letting no light in from the street lamps outside, but Juice can feel Chibs' drowsy eyes watching him, knows that he's got the guy's attention. He squeezes his fingers around the base of Chibs' cock, swirls his tongue around the head once, twice, three times, before sliding his lips back down again, finding a rhythm that will keep Chibs on edge. Chibs groans and his knees fall open either side of Juice. The hand that had been smoothing over the skin of Juice's scalp shifts down to cup his cheek, thumb worrying over the bone.

He feels Chibs' tense as his climax approaches, reaches up to grasp Chibs' hand and pin it to the bed, gets the other hand pinned as well and then he can shift and concentrate on opening his throat to the other man. It's fucking hard and Juice doesn't normally bother, Chibs has certainly never asked him to, but right now, with the older man quiet and passive, it feels right- like it's something Juice is giving rather than something that Chibs is taking.

Chibs' breath stutters and Juice is choking down spunk, thinking to himself, I bet your wife never did that for you. He can't help feeling a vicious little stab of satisfaction.

 

&&&

 

Chibs' orgasm washes over him, cosy and soft and mellow. God alone knows how he's managed to get it up twice in one day, he's not twenty anymore. Maybe it's got something to do with that halo.

The mattress shifts as Juice gets up to return to his own bed.

'Hey, you alright?' Chibs reaches out across the chasm dividing the two beds and pats around blindly until he finds Juice's shoulder, then his elbow and finally his hand, drags it over and presses a kiss to the fingers. He can smell himself on them.

'Sure.' Juice's voice sounds distant in the darkness but Chibs hears the creak of bedsprings as the other man rolls on his side, to face him and he does the same, keeps hold of Juice's hand and strokes a circle into the palm.

'Hell of a fucking day,' Chibs says because he has no idea what to say, but doesn't want Juice to fall asleep and leave him behind yet.

'Yeah... Must have been worth it though, seeing your girls again?' Juice's fingers wriggle until they get a hold on Chibs' hand and then shift so their fingers are all lined up, pad to pad.

'Aye. Can't believe how much Kerrianne's grown... Last time I saw her, she was this fat little dot with a round face an' pigtails...' Chibs snorts as he remembers the doll she'd carried around with her everywhere, Maidie, it was called. One of those with blinking eyes, that wets itself. Its hair had all been cut off, probably by Paddy, and it had been naked but for a little t-shirt borrowed from some other discarded toy. Fucking horrible thing. They'd all tried convincing her to part with it, bought her new dolls, better ones, but Kerrianne had just greeted each one with a wary eye, said firmly that Maidie was her baby, and that had been that.

'She looks like you.' Juice says.

'Yeah? Was thinkin' she'd got just like Fi.'

'Kind of- she's got your eyes though.' Juice fidgets and the bed groans again- lad ended up with the shitty bed, by the sounds of things. Chibs tugs him over onto his bed with him and the mattress dips and jiggles as Juice navigates himself over the gap between the two, before sliding his arms around Chibs' waist, tucking his head in beside Chibs' own on the lumpy pillow. 'Door's locked,' Juice whispers. Chibs shrugs, bit late now if it wasn't...

Chibs feels his eyes drifting shut again- he can never stay awake long after a shag. Juice's lips ghost over his own and then there's just the sensation of warm air puffing over his cheek as Juice breathes, settling in for the night and probably closing his own eyes.

God alone knows what they're gonna have to deal with in the morning. They've still the threat of Jimmy O standing over them all, but for now, there's bugger all anyone can do about it. His girls are safe, though. The club's still whole, and Juice is tucked in next to him, his breath curling into a snore. It's a start.

 

End


End file.
